


It Can Be Like This

by TrenchcoatRats



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Human Disaster Zack Fair, Light Angst, M/M, Multi, discussion of polyamory
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-20 06:07:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13140657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrenchcoatRats/pseuds/TrenchcoatRats
Summary: As it turns out, going out to eat with that tiny infantryman can only be excused under "lunch dates" for so long until it just becomes a regular date.





	It Can Be Like This

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pt_tucker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pt_tucker/gifts).



Even with the news that Genesis copies had managed to infiltrate Midgar, Zack wasn't going to be going anywhere for a while. It was going to be at least forty minutes before a helicopter could be in the area to take him back, so he needs something to do in the meantime. After a moment of contemplation, he remembers that Cloud had also been sent out to Junon and heads back in the direction he arrived in the hopes of passing him along the way. If nothing else, he could pull out the puppy dog eyes out on Cloud until he took pity on him and bought lunch for them both. He could really do with the company right now and the food would not go unappreciated. When he arrives back to his starting point, there was no spiky blond hair in sight, but there were three troopers huddled off to the side, seemingly having a casual discussion. None of them were skinny or short enough to be Cloud, but there was a chance that they knew where he was so Zack heads over to talk to them.

“Hey there, good work you guys!” He says, shooting off an informal salute.

“Sir!” The troopers cry, all three falling into perfect salutes.

“At ease,” Zack said, waving them off with a smile. “I had a question for you three, do you know where Cloud Strife is?”

He could read the surprise on the troopers faces through their helmets that only grows more obvious by the look that the three exchange.

“Uh, Strife? Haven’t seen him since the start of the mission, Sir.”

The trooper in the middle snickers under his breath before chiming in, “If you’re looking for him, you might wanna try following the smell.”

Zack screws his eyes shut in confusion for a second, the city as a whole smelled abhorrent and he wasn’t a tracker dog, but when no other answer seemed forthcoming, he heads past the troopers. Once he passed them, he did begin to notice a different smell combination emerge. The scents of oil, blood, rot, and vomit were assaulting his nose and when he turned his head towards the water, he saw the origin for one of those smells. Cloud had his head over the railing, seemingly trying to puke out everything he’d ever had. Judging by the puddle Zack passes on his way over to Cloud, he hadn’t been able to get to the railing on time. When Cloud upheaves his stomach again, Zack winces and pulls his turtleneck to cover his nose before placing a comforting hand on Cloud’s back.

“Hey there buddy, doing okay?”

Cloud raises his head to look at Zack and snorts at what he sees. He opens his mouth to respond, but then promptly dry heaves over the railing again. When he finally stops dry heaving, he turns back to Zack and gives him a thumbs-up.

“Yeah I’m doing great, Zack.”

Zack shakes his head in amusement before retorting, “I was going to graciously invite you to pay for our lunch but,” he trails off.

Cloud straightens up to reach for a small bottle in a side pocket. After taking a long swig, gurgling, and spitting it out over the side, he casts Zack an apologetic look.

“Sorry, is it okay if I take a raincheck?”

“Yeah of course! Lemme give you my PHS info so we can plan.”

Once they swap information and send each other a quick message, they part ways, with Zack heading back to the landing zone and Cloud towards the three troopers. After that, with the exception of sending each other a message every few days, mostly complaining about their coworkers, Zack and Cloud don’t speak to each other again for three weeks. Zack had no idea what was going on in Cloud’s life but if it was anything like his, running around in Midgar dealing with monsters, Genesis copies, and doing the occasional errand for Aerith, he understood why their communication was sparse. But Zack’s perseverance was finally going to pay off, not even ten minutes after he had completed his latest mission, involving a Wutai spy hiding in Loveless Avenue, that his PHS buzzed. 

>My superior’s complaining about a First Class SOLDIER disrupting our patrol schedule by finding a Wutai Spy. Know anything about that? P.S. I’m under the LOVELESS billboard if that offer of a meal was still open.

Zack feels his face split into a grin, the first time he’d been able to smile in a while, and immediately backtracks from the entrance to the Shinra building back to LOVELESS Avenue. Within the first few steps into the Avenue, he catches sight of Cloud’s spiky hair, for once not constrained under a helmet. He jogs over, slapping Cloud on the back when he gets there.

“Didn’t keep you waiting, did I?”

Cloud turns and flashes Zack a bright grin that makes his stomach do summersaults. 

“You’re fine! I had to change out of my uniform anyway,” He jerks his head towards the duffel bag on his shoulder. “I was thinking, I heard some good things about a place here in Sector 8. I have no idea what it’s actually like, but if you’re open to surprises…” He trails off, apology clear in his voice for not knowing the specifics of their destination.

“Cloud, I’ve lived in Midgar since I was fourteen years old and I still don’t know where everything is. However, I do know where Sector 8 is, so this place is fine with me.”

The two make their way back to where the fountain is, then towards the staircase. They don’t say anything on the way, but they brush shoulders and try to trip each other no fewer than six times before they reach what Zack assumes is their destination. Cloud pulls open the door, causing the bell at the top of the door frame to ring out, for him and Zack enters with a quiet “thanks” directed towards Cloud. The restaurant is small, with only three tables able to comfortably fit, but it seems cozy. The two took a seat at one of the tables and glanced at the menus while they waited to be served. Zack glances at the items, up to Cloud, back to the menu and then begins to laugh quietly.

Cloud’s eyes rose to meet his and he raises an eyebrow, “What’s so funny?”

“You took me to a Wutainese resturant, Cloud.”

It took a moment for Cloud to realize the connection between Zack’s reaction and their location until he remembered exactly how they were able to meet for lunch. As soon as he figured out, he let out a loud snort of laughter that had Zack bent over in hysterics.

“Shut up! I didn’t think this through, okay?!”

“No, really?” Zack manages to drawl in between his snickers, “You took a SOLDIER, one who fought in Wutai out to get Wutai food, that takes guts.”

Cloud’s head jerked in surprise, “You fought during the war?”

“During the very end, yeah. I was only there for one battle and I was there-” With Angeal, his mind supplies, and Zack is painfully aware of the weight of the Buster Sword on his back, the way his cheek still burns like a fresh wound, and the buzzing in his head that’s only worsened with each day ever since he murdered the man who had meant the world to him.

“Zack?” Cloud says quietly, looking at him in concern.

It takes a minute for Zack to come back to himself, to bury the pain, ignore the weight, and forget Modeoheim and the scent of burning dumbapples, but he gives Cloud a weak grin.

“Sorry ‘bout that.” He says quietly, not quite managing to meet Cloud’s eyes.

Cloud opens his mouth but promptly closes it when a server comes back to take their order. As soon as the server departs, Zack takes a small breath and throws himself into the present.

“So, Cloud, favorite color?”

Cloud stares at Zack for a second, not knowing how to react to the conversation’s tonal shift before hesitantly responding with, “Purple?”  
“Mine’s blue, like the color of the sky. What about season?”

“I really like fall, it’s not cold enough to snow but all the dragons and wolves still stay away from town to conserve energy.”

Zack’s eyes bulge at the idea of having to deal with dragons as a normal part of small town life. The worst Gongaga had to worry about were sandstorms, thankfully.

“Winter’s always been my favorite, there’s no more draught and we reach reasonable temperatures for us to play outside in.” But judging by the way Cloud’s face screws up in disgust, the north had a very different winter.

“Nibelheim winters are vicious. The wolves come into town and try to kill anything and anyone they can to try to live until summer. I think our highest winter temperatures are around -30°. Even during the day, we aren’t supposed to be outside for very long in case something gets too hungry.” 

Zack whistles quietly, “Anyone ever tell you Nibelheim sounds like the worst place in the world?”

Cloud laughs, the sound kicking Zack in the gut. “You’re just a scaredy-cat southerner. Speaking of cats, do you prefer cats or dogs?”

“Dogs, hands down.” Zack didn’t even hesitate.

Cloud’s eyes fill with respect from his quick response, “Me too, wish Shinra would let us have animals…”

Their server came back with their drinks after that, allowing the boys to sip quietly at their drinks until Zack broke the silence by blowing bubbles into his. Cloud snorted while taking a sip, getting soda in his nose. Any hopes of a normal conversation were gone after that, with Zack cackling hysterically while Cloud tried to stop the burning inside his nose. When the two got ahold of themselves, Zack launched back into their questions game.

“So,” He says with a mischievous light in his eyes, “how old were you when you enlisted in the Shinra military?”

Cloud pauses from swirling his remaining soda around in its glass before quietly saying, “I turned fourteen two weeks after I handed in my paperwork.”

Zack lets out a small huff of air through his teeth. He had been worried that Cloud would have been the stupid kid to try to enlist at age twelve, but fourteen was still too young to sign away your life. Shame Zack was just now realizing this.

“Huh, I was four months away from turning fifteen when I enlisted. What is it about Shinra that just draws fourteen year olds to illegally try to enlist?” He mutters the last part quietly to himself. 

“Okay, make or break question here. Everything’s on the line for this one, you ready?”

“Cloud, I’ve been ready since before you were even born.” Zack says, unable to keep the grin off his face.

“Why did you you want to join Shinra?” He asks, lacing his fingers together. His pose inexplicably reminds Zack of his first meeting with Director Lazard, the glint in their eyes and, odd as it seemed, the shape of their nose was so similar it was briefly hard to completely separate the two of them in his mind. Without even thinking about everything that’s changed and the few things that have remained the same, Zack repeats the answer he gave to the Director.

“I wanted to become a hero, still do really.” He doesn’t say it with the same fanfare as he did back then, but his words still carry the strength of his aspirations. 

“Well if anyone could be a hero, it’d be you.” Just like that, the brief resemblance to the Director was gone, banished into the back of Zack’s mind to join what felt like most of his memories from Shinra.

“And you, Cloud? Why’d you travel across an entire continent as a motion sick thirteen year old?”

Cloud’s answer comes after only a second’s pause, “Because I wanted to meet Sephiroth.”

Zack’s mind imploded inward, once, twice, then reassembled hesitantly.

“What?”

Cloud lightly shrugged, face pink, “I was thirteen, he was on every piece of Shinra news we got, and I may have had a sorta still there crush on him.”

Zack smacks his head against the table and leaves it there.

“Zack?” Cloud’s voice doesn’t sound offended, not yet, but it does sound concerned and confused, so Zack explains his reaction before Cloud can come to the wrong conclusion.

“You’ve got lousy taste in guys Cloud, let me tell you.” The Sephiroth rant has been a long time coming and it certainly helps that Cloud needs to be dissuaded from this crush as quickly as possible. Blindly worshipping SOLDIERS leads only to heartbreak, as Zack has recently learned.

“He throws the worst hissyfits I’ve ever seen. He won’t say anything, but he won’t do his paperwork and if you go to find him to sign for a time-sensitive document that he put on your desk the day it was due, he’ll mysteriously vanish for hours and hours only to reappear like nothing happened once the deadline’s passed. He’s also incredibly selfish, always hogging the training room, hoarding all the working pens on paperwork days, and making me do missions he doesn’t want to like killing-” He stops, tries to shove the words back in his brain, fails, and tries to let them crumble in his mouth like ash until he chokes.

Cloud stares at him with wide eyes, his elbow brushing his untouched food. Zack has no idea when it arrived, but it was probably while he was complaining about Sephiroth. He takes a deep breath, thinks about what to say, and imagines Aerith’s church covered in flowers with the only remnant of Angeal left standing guard over it.

“SOLDIER, it’s, it’s a den of monsters. You deserve better than to get involved with anyone like us.”

“You don’t mean that, do you Zack?” Cloud’s voice is quiet and he bites his lip after the sentence is finished. He looks like he doesn’t know if he wants an answer.

Zack thinks of Sebastian and Essai, ripped apart until there was nothing left of them, Angeal who thought himself so monstrous that he deserved to die as a physical beast, and the emptiness that Zack feels in his heart and head that he just can’t get rid of, and says nothing. 

For better or worse, Cloud says nothing for the rest of their meal either. The two eat in silence, thinking on what they discussed. As the food on Cloud’s plate disappeared, the atmosphere grew more relaxed as Zack centered himself in the present once more. Cloud’s fork scrapes lightly against the last portion of food on his plate, causing Zack to glance at his own plate. He had only managed to take two bites from the food, though he had a third on his fork. He placed the fork back on the plate and gives Cloud a small smile.

“I’m ready to go when you are,” He says lightly, ignoring the double take Cloud does at Zack’s practically untouched food.

Once again, Cloud says nothing however. He pays at the front desk in silence, ignoring Zack’s protest as the two of them exited the small restaurant. Once they exited, Cloud pins him on the spot with a look.

“Zack, you gave me a lot to think about, and I wanted to thank you for that. But,” he pauses here, before continuing, his words taking on an unyielding quality, “I don’t think you’re a monster, Zack and I doubt you would ever have the capability of becoming a monster. You’re a good person and I’m glad that you’re my friend.”

Zack’s stomach has that little flip-flop feeling for the third time that night. Of course, that was before Cloud leaned over to kiss him on the cheek. After that happened, Zack was almost positive his skin looked as red as a summon materia. All he could do was gape at Cloud as he pulled away slowly.

“Was it that bad?” Cloud says quietly, seeming to retreat slightly in himself.

“No, no, it was...good. I liked that a lot.” 

Cloud’s smile hits him again and Zack realizes where he had gotten that feeling in his stomach from before. He got it when he saw Aerith wearing the ribbon he got her, or when she laughed at one of his jokes. So, he thinks to himself, he has a crush on Cloud, who has a crush on Sephiroth, while Zack himself has a girlfriend that Cloud does not know about. 

“I liked it too,” Cloud says, oblivious to Zack’s mental crisis, “and I don’t like smooching monsters. So...there.”

That snaps Zack out of his thought process and immediately sent him into a laughing fit. The situation preceding this was far from funny, but Cloud’s grasp of basic language had failed him so spectacularly that he couldn’t help it. While Zack’s not paying attention, Cloud shoves him away, which of course does nothing. As soon as Cloud remembers that they work and live in the same spot which means that he’ll have Zack laughing at him until he reaches his barracks, he groans in agony. If anything, Zack starts laughing even harder.

Once they arrive outside the Shinra building, however, Zack’s laughter’s died down. With a serious look in his eyes he reaches out and hugs Cloud tightly.

“Thanks, for today. As bad as I was, this was this best day I’ve had in a long time.”

“I’m glad that you enjoyed yourself. Hopefully we can do this again soon, but next time you’ll pay for everything Mr. First Class.”

Zack laughs again, then lets go of Cloud. “Can do Mr. Short Trooper.”

Cloud rolls his eyes and turns to head into the building, “Message me when you get the chance?” He calls out.

“Of course! I need to complain about Shinra employees somehow.”

Zack watches Cloud head inside and thinks for a minute. Tomorrow, if there aren’t any important missions waiting for him, he’ll head down to the slums to talk to Aerith about everything. Everything, he told himself, including how happy the thought of a “next time” with Cloud made him.

**Author's Note:**

> Up next, Zack talks about his feelings, goes on another date, then another, and then things take a turn.


End file.
